BOGOR, Indonesia—In at least one way, it’s a place right out of a storybook. A patch of Indonesian forest is the last ecosystem on Earth where nearly every iconic animal from Rudyard Kipling’s “The Jungle Book” still co-exists. Unfortunately, there is no storybook ending in sight for the Leuser Ecosystem in steamy, mountainous northern Sumatra.... Read more

]]>

An Indonesian orangutan. Sumatra’s orangutan population–to say nothing of the populations of other iconic mammal species–could be severely damaged by plans to expand roads through an area of forest there, a new study contends. Terry Sunderland/CIFOR photo

BOGOR, Indonesia—In at least one way, it’s a place right out of a storybook.

A patch of Indonesian forest is the last ecosystem on Earth where nearly every iconic animal from Rudyard Kipling’s “The Jungle Book” still co-exists.

Unfortunately, there is no storybook ending in sight for the Leuser Ecosystem in steamy, mountainous northern Sumatra.

Having so many roads cutting through this big mountainous block of forest will completely fragment the area

The current Aceh Spatial Plan—an expansion of the former Ladia Galaska road construction scheme—is slated to slice through highly sensitive areas of the Leuser Ecosystem in Sumatra’s Aceh and Northern Sumatra provinces.

According to the study, the Ladia Galaska plan will threaten two of the three largest remaining Sumatran orangutan populations. Under current projections, continuation of the road construction project could result in an estimated loss of 1,384 of the remaining 6,600 Sumatran orangutans by 2030.

Despite several years of promising initiatives to safeguard the Leuser Ecosystem, changes in the political and economic landscape of the region have catalyzed development plans at the expense of conservation schemes.

It is not only the survival of Sumatran orangutans that is at stake. The Leuser Ecosystem is considered by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) to be one of the “world’s most irreplaceable protected areas.”

“Having so many roads cutting through this big mountainous block of forest will completely fragment the area. And we’re already seeing it on the satellites,” said David Gaveau, a scientist with the Center for International Forestry Research (CIFOR) and a co-author of the study.

Gaveau, who has been studying the Leuser Ecosystem for more than five years, worries that his most grave projections for the fate of the area—and the fabled mammals within—are coming true.

In 2009, a study led by Gaveau projected three potential fates for the forest, based on factors such as the amount of new roads constructed, the competitiveness of carbon credit prices against the price of palm oil, and the success of the regional REDD+ project (a financial scheme to curb carbon emissions through avoided deforestation).

Scenario 3 (pictured above, at right), in which road construction would be halted and REDD+ would be implemented across the province, “was a best-case scenario from the viewpoint of conservation, wildlife, and environment,” Gaveau said.

At the time, many conservationists saw reason for hope that such a scenario could be realized.

“Back in 2008 there was a lot of interest from the banking industry in carbon credits,” Gaveau said. “Not because they were after saving forests, but more because they were thinking of making big dollars. At the time, the U.S. was talking about establishing a cap-and-trade system, whereby it was mandatory for companies to reduce their emissions.”

The then-governor of Aceh, Irwandi Yusuf, spearheaded efforts to establish a functioning REDD+ program in the region as an alternative to deforestation-driven development plans, and was seen as a champion of conservation initiatives.

At the 2007 UN Climate Change conference in Bali, “they struck this agreement that [investment bank] Merrill Lynch would buy the carbon credits, [NGO] Flora and Fauna International would help the Government of Aceh establish all of its technical baselines to understand how much carbon they could actually sell, and [social entrepreneur] Dorjee Sun would act as a broker between all these entities,” Gaveau said.

EVEN-WORSE-CASE SCENARIO

Then, gradually, everything fell apart.

Merrill Lynch imploded in the 2008 financial crisis. Talk of a cap-and-trade system in the United States disappeared by 2010. Carbon prices stayed uncompetitively low. The REDD+ scheme floundered, and in 2011, the governor who had championed it delivered a final blow.

“He did this out of frustration. He didn’t see one single dollar come into the local government coffers from this carbon credit, and he needed to do something for his people,” he added.

Six years later, “REDD+ is not being implemented,” Gaveau said. “Aceh’s new provincial government, led by Governor Zaini Abdullah, is pushing a new provincial land-use plan that is accelerating illegal logging and plantation development in the Leuser Ecosystem. The deforestation rate has gone up and the road construction has continued and expanded, so we are back to the worst-case scenario one: no REDD+ intervention, high rate of deforestation, and new roads are built.”

The Aceh Spatial Plan itself has never been formally approved by the Minister of Home Affairs as is required under Indonesian National Law, and experts say that it contravenes Aceh’s own Governance Law No 11 (2006) obligating Aceh’s Government to conserve the Leuser Ecosystem.

As things stand today, a further 16 percent decline in orangutan habitat and the loss of 25 percent of the current total population of Sumatran orangutans is likely in the next 15 years.

SLIPPERY SLOPE FOR HUMANS, TOO

Despite claims of popular support among locals for the previous Ladia Galaska road scheme, the environmental impact of the development of these roads—and their planned expansions in the new spatial plans—may be an economic cost not worth bearing.

By some estimates, the ecosystem services provided by the Leuser Ecosystem, such as protection from flooding and soil erosion, could total US$200 million.

“These roads will also probably be ravaged by these floods, and it is going to be very costly to repair these roads,” Gaveau said.

ALTERNATE ROUTES

When and where roads must be built, the recent study recommends that the construction projects be rerouted or modified whenever possible.

Gaveau sees this as a viable alternative to the Ladia Galaska scheme, which would be good for both people and wildlife.

“The area being a mountainous area, economically, Aceh would be better off improving the roads along the coast­. If we are talking about trade-offs between the environment and the economy, improving the existing coastal roads is a much better option.”

For more information about this research, please contact David Gaveau at d.gaveau@cgiar.org.

BOGOR, Indonesia—A new study has found for the first time a link between the availability of wild meat and human malnutrition, and calls for a better balance between conservation and development objectives in the management of bushmeat. A rapid increase in the hunting of wild animals has raised concerns of “empty forests” — a hypothetical... Read more

]]>

BOGOR, Indonesia—A new study has found for the first time a link between the availability of wild meat and human malnutrition, and calls for a better balance between conservation and development objectives in the management of bushmeat.

A rapid increase in the hunting of wild animals has raised concerns of “empty forests” — a hypothetical scenario where forests are void of large mammal species — and therefore “empty stomachs” in communities that depend on bushmeat for nutrition.

But the new research finds that things aren’t always that simple.

“What we’ve found is evidence that some areas in the central African region seem to have achieved a good balance between the amount of food available in terms of wild meat and nutrition,” according to John E. Fa, the lead author of the study, a visiting professor at Imperial College London and Senior Research Associate at the Center for International Forestry Research (CIFOR). The study also involved collaboration from spatial modelers at the Universidad de Málaga in Spain.

“But there are other areas in central Africa where malnutrition is a real problem, and that has to do with there being a lot of people and not enough wild meat and other sources of proteins, vitamins and iron,” he said.

The study compared two different landscape types in central Africa’s Rainforest Biotic Zone, which includes the countries of the Congo Basin.

What we need to start doing is getting the people in development and the wildlife biologists together to work out ways to achieve a balance between conserving wildlife and ensuring people have enough food

It found that child stunting was significantly more prevalent—higher than 50 percent in some areas—in the savanna areas along the northern, eastern and southern fringes of the Rainforest Biotic Zone, where populations are more dense and wild meat hunting is more intensive, than in more central and remote forest areas, where child stunting was uncommon—less than 30 percent, despite less access to health facilities—and where the environment seemed “capable of adequately supporting existing human populations at a reasonable level of health.”

Child stunting is commonly used as an indicator of overall malnutrition.

The paper argues that this spatial disparity in child stunting is not a spurious effect “but one that powerfully points to the significance of wild meat in sustaining human populations in central Africa.”

Closing this gap will require those designing development programs to consider bushmeat’s role in nutrition more seriously, rather than seeing bushmeat solely through a conservation lens, the researchers wrote.

“What we need to start doing is getting the people in development and the wildlife biologists together to work out ways to achieve a balance between conserving wildlife and ensuring people have enough food,” Fa said. “Because in reality, if we don’t sort out the food security issues for people in those heavily populated areas, we’re not going to do anything for wildlife either.”

“In these heavily populated areas where there isn’t enough wild meat, we need to do something about alternative protein for people. We’ve talked about this for years now and haven’t really got anywhere.”

A mother and her children on the road to Kinsagani, Democratic Republic of Congo. A new study has found a link between availability of bushmeat and child stunting in the Congo Basin. Ollivier Girard/CIFOR photo

‘THE ELEPHANT IN THE ROOM’

The study looked at the distribution of mammalian species and classified them according to their hunting potential, estimating how much wild meat was likely to be available to communities.

After finding a strong association between the availability and diversity of mammals and child stunting, the study tested three hypotheses: that mammalian diversity patterns directly influence malnutrition in humans; that mammalian diversity patterns influence human population levels and their impacts and these are correlated with malnutrition in humans; and that human population levels and their impacts influence both mammalian diversity areas and malnutrition in humans.

But what they found was that different hypotheses were true in different parts of the region, meaning that programs addressing conservation and nutrition would need to better recognize the uneven distribution of wild meat diversity and availability—and corresponding nutrition levels—to target the right problems in the right areas.

“For example, we need to start with these areas where malnutrition is higher. The results can help us know how to prioritize efforts in wildlife and nutrition, and it’s these areas with higher populations that have the greatest need,” Fa said.

Without finding alternative sources of nutrients for people in the more densely populated areas, demand for wild meat in those areas will grow and put pressure on supply in more remote areas, potentially disrupting the healthy balance that more remote communities have between wildlife conservation and nutrition.

“We tend not to talk much about population size and population control anymore — it’s very much the elephant in the room. But I do believe the main issues in these areas where child stunting is higher is that there are too many people, and that can impact areas that are in balance,” Fa said.

“There is a fundamental need to do something about cities and big urban areas, because they are the ones placing the demands and the ones more compromised in terms of their food security.”

BOGOR, Indonesia—It’s one of the dark sides of the Asian economic boom. Growing demand for wild meat and traditional medicine among Asia’s burgeoning urban middle class represents a grave threat to forest-based wildlife in the region and beyond, according to a new scientific review. The authors of the review, published by the Center for... Read more

]]>

A bowl of “turtle jelly,” a delicacy in China that is increasingly sought by a growing Chinese middle class, which threatens overharvesting of certain species of turtles. Flickr photo

BOGOR, Indonesia—It’s one of the dark sides of the Asian economic boom.

Growing demand for wild meat and traditional medicine among Asia’s burgeoning urban middle class represents a grave threat to forest-based wildlife in the region and beyond, according to a new scientific review.

The authors of the review, published by the Center for International Forestry Research (CIFOR), write that education—and experimentation—will be needed to make a dent in a multibillion-dollar market plagued by unsustainability and racked with illegality.

Bushmeat—the hunting of forest-based animals for food and other purposes—has been a cornerstone of nutrition and culture for Asia for thousands of years. But while bushmeat was once consumed primarily by poor and rural communities, it is increasingly finding its way into the region’s more affluent urban centers, where attitudes toward bushmeat are changing. Some types of bushmeat are now being consumed—whether as food or as medicine—as a luxury item.

The CIFOR study reviews scientific literature on bushmeat in Asia, highlighting growing concerns among experts that unsustainable harvesting of bushmeat across the region represents a “major threat to the biodiversity” of forests in East and Southeast Asia.

“In the case of bushmeat, there was once an argument that it was necessary to address starvation or poverty in Asia, but Asia is not what it used to be,” said CIFOR scientist Miguel Pinedo-Vasquez, a co-author of the paper. “Because of development and new wealth, Asian nations now have to seriously think about reversing the depletion of wildlife species and degradation of forested land.”

“Asia should engage now, not just in trees but repopulating wildlife,” he said.

The paper calls for testing potential solutions that do not simply impose a blanket ban on bushmeat hunting but that aim for sustainable consumption and trade that considers food security, livelihoods, health issues and local cultural values and knowledge.

Crucial to establishing a sustainable wildlife management system is understanding urban residents’ changing attitudes toward bushmeat consumption and identifying the social drivers of the wildlife trade, according to the paper, which highlights findings from a growing body of documentation of the demographics of urban bushmeat consumers.

In Vietnam, for example, wild meat is now widely consumed by high-income, high-status males of all ages and educational levels, and is used as a way of communicating prestige and obtaining social leverage, according to a study in the northern city of Hanoi, where the main reason given for not eating bushmeat is that it is “too expensive.”

But bushmeat is not just for eating.

The use of animal parts or products for medicinal purposes—from rhino horn to tiger penis to turtle jelly—has a long history in East and Southeast Asia and is so prevalent today that “traditional” Asian medicine is on a “collision course with wildlife preservation,” the authors write, citing a 2011 paper.

Clearly, the economic boom is making matters worse.

“With an increase in wealth and population, the medicinal market has grown too, so we are seeing higher pressure on animals like turtles and tigers to supply demand,” Pinedo-Vasquez said.

Asia’s development has also resulted in new routes for bushmeat to fill that demand.

While urbanization has improved infrastructure to aid economic growth, newly developed roads and transportation systems are also creating corridors for the trade of wildlife for food and medicine, both legal and illegal. Rural hunters are increasingly able to access international markets through these corridors, sending bushmeat and animal products to urban centers, from where the products are either consumed locally or, increasingly, sent overseas.

This phenomenon is seen in the Mekong Delta region of Southeast Asia, where protected areas provide the last refuges for wildlife and biodiversity in the area. But transportation infrastructure development and land conversion that encroaches on the boundaries of these areas threatens them further. “Realistic mitigation measures are needed to prevent these economic corridors from becoming wildlife trade superhighways,” according to one paper cited in the CIFOR review.

TURTLE POWER

The turtle trade is one example of just how far these economic corridors reach.

“The Chinese market for turtles is huge and is always going to be an incentive,” Pinedo-Vasquez said. “Turtles come from everywhere in Asia, and the ones from the wild have more value, so we are seeing them go from rural areas, to urban centers and then on to countries like China.”

“There are so many established networks in Asia to feed the Chinese market. Even hunters from as far as the Amazon ship turtles to China because the market is so big,” he said.

One potential solution the study’s authors propose is to test how sustainable substitutes, farmed or synthetic, are received by consumers who traditionally value turtle meat and products.

Public education is also recommended for explaining the harmful effects of consuming illegal wildlife products, the authors write. The authors, however, acknowledge the difficulty in influencing cultural attitudes toward such products, citing as an example a study in the Indian state of Nagaland, where wildlife laws have largely been ineffective due to cultural traditions of hunting for meat, perceived medicinal and ritual value, and community ownership of the forests.

“In many parts of Asia, these cultural practices, combined with lax law enforcement, means little is being done on the ground to make the trade sustainable,” Pinedo-Vasquez said. “In many places, if a law enforcement officer sees a family eating a monkey, instead of fining them, he might just join them and eat the monkey, because that’s what people traditionally do there.”

CAN CERTIFICATION WORK?

The paper cited a previously published report that recommended improving the knowledge base of species traded and educating consumers about the effects that demand for bushmeat and traditional medicine has on these species.

Certification schemes are also a potential solution to making the bushmeat and wildlife trades sustainable and should be tested, the paper suggests.

“To get these countries to start thinking about sustainable use of wildlife, we have to go beyond what is legal and illegal, and come up with solutions that address these more complex issues,” Pinedo-Vasquez said.